Someone posted this comment on Facebook, and Bojidar Marinov put the dude in his place as usual. It was just on some random post that I can’t find now. Here’s the guy’s comment and Bo’s response.
———————Random Guy
Where has the heresy of Lone Ranger so called “Christianity” come from? Why do people believe they can be saved with just them and their Bible when the Bible teaches the necessity of baptism, holy Communion and the Church?
———————Bo
No such “heresy” exists. There is no one that believes such a thing. Every Christian today believes in the necessity of communion with other Christians. The divide is not between those who believe that communion is not necessary and those who believe that it is necessary, the divide is between those who believe that such communion needs to be organic, natural, and driven by the Holy Spirit, mutual love, care and concern, and those who are craving power and want to replace communion with power structures, submission to illegitimate hierarchy, mass manipulation, and control. The latter, in order to justify their unbiblical and evil view of communion, and also to keep dummies like you manipulated and controlled, have made up the false accusation of “lone ranger” against the former, whereas the true communion is with the former, not with the latter.
As to who first declared that a Christian is a Christian even if alone against everyone else, it’s the Bible, in the example of the lives of heroes like Noah, Jacob, Joseph, David, Elijah, Jeremiah, Daniel, Paul, etc. The early church expressed that principle with the phrase “contra mundum,” and it became a sign for those who stood alone against the rest. Monasticism was specifically approved of by the early Councils, and the Council of Chalcedon (451) which gave us the fullest description of the Trinitarian formula, also established the legitimacy of the monastic way of life. Augustin, himself one of the greatest champions of Christian orthodoxy, spoke highly of the example of St. Anthony of the Desert, and described the life of a lone Christian with the highest possible praise. Etc., etc., I can continue for pages showing how the early church approved of lone Christians doing the work of God in their specific area. Similar examples can be given from the era of the Reformation, and specifically the Reformation in Scotland (read The Scots Worthies to see how many of them spent significant parts of their lives as lone Christians) and the colonization of North America.
As to the modern concept that a Christian is not one unless he is trampled under the feet of men only because these men pretend to be “elders” or “pastors,” that concept is fairly new, dating back to the 1930s. It is entirely the product of philosophical collectivism, that means, it is a sister doctrine to secular socialism and Communism.